Emblazoned with a bold 35 for the 35th expedition to the International Space Station (ISS), this patch portrays a natural moonlit view of the Earth from the ISS at the moment of sunrise, one of the sixteen that occur each day at orbital velocity, with glowing bands of Earth's atmosphere dispersing the sun's bright light into primary colors.

The Earth is depicted as it often appears from space, without recognizable coastlines or boundaries - just as the international endeavor of living and working together in space blurs technical and cultural boundaries between nations.

The ISS is the unseen central figure of the image, since the view is from a window of the Space Station itself, commemorating full use of the Space Station as a long-duration dwelling from which humans can develop techniques and technologies to further explore.

The crew points out, "The arc of the Earth's horizon with the sun's arrows of light imply a bow shooting the imagination to Mars and the cosmos where our species may one day thrive."

The patch was designed by artist Paul Fjeld (see below) working with Chris Hadfield and Tom Marshburn.

PowerCat

WOW!! Good looking patch for sure. Don't remember seeing a patch design released so soon before other space missions. Expeditions 30-34 still to come out with their designs.

LM-12

Nice patch - looks a bit empty though without the crew names. Emblem designs that include crew names can easily be changed if a crew member is replaced before launch, as was done on STS-133. Patches are another story. They could be mass-produced after launch to avoid that problem.

Paul has done an outstanding job! The STS-90 patch is one of the best.

This patch is stunning!

NavySpaceFan

Great patch!!! STS-90 is one of my favorites, and the artist has made another winner!

Robert Pearlman

More about the Expedition 35 patch, courtesy its artist Paul Fjeld:

The commander, Chris Hadfield, emailed me before his appointment was made public last fall and asked if I'd do it. I'd worked with him before at the CSA when I was a contractor there and did the STS-100 crew patch (from a design by Scott Parazynski).

He and Tom Marshburn gave me a few ideas of things they would like to see in the E35 design (like astro pin, station, "zoomies", etc.) and, with some refinement, I did a few concepts. All of them bombed.

So Chris suggested we have a conference call and I basically got a very deep sense of what the spaceflight experience meant to them and what it was like - a great conversation. They also expressed a desire that the patch be really clean and simple.

The next day, out popped this baby. I'd have to say it was directly inspired by how they spoke of their experiences.

We fussed over some stuff (mostly font for the "35") and they took it to Russia to live with for a couple of months. Roman liked it and the other crew that would share the E35 mission all gave it a thumbs up.

That was it! We were done way early which is why we jumped some crews that will fly before E35. I really thought we'd still be iterating through the summer.

The aspects of the design that couldn't fit in the official description are: the speed of orbital flight (which they both stressed is really impressive - you're up there and you can really feel it. You're bookin!), the fact that there is no "up", and the color transition of the sunrise which happens very fast and I have suggested with the red/yellow/white sun streaks. The whole thing should feel like a bow shooting an arrow to the heavens.

I really think that the lack of names make this design work. I tried it with names but didn't like it and didn't suggest it and the crew is fine with that.

Mike Okuda

Beautiful!

Fezman92

It's nice and simple. I really like view of Earth as if you are viewing it from the station.